Four Quad City residents are conducting a two-month bald eagle survey amid the construction of a cannabis dispensary and a truck stop adjacent to the Milan Bottoms floodplain forest wetland complex in Rock Island.
Retired biologist and local bald eagle expert Kelly McKay says the effort is intended to counter a single-day survey conducted on behalf of the developers that counted only two bald eagles and zero nests in the area next to the 10-acre site.
“I don't know how they could possibly know that. They produced a three-page report. So it's not even really a scientific report. I refer to it as more of a glorified book report,” McKay said.
McKay criticized the survey by the Kansas-based engineering consulting firm, Terracon, because it documented eagle activity in the area for a single day. He added that he documented six active nests within one mile of the development in 2025.
“You can nearly see all six of the nests from the proposed development site or very near the proposed development site. These six active nests produced at least seven young eagles last year,” McKay said.
“It is still a massive bald eagle night roost. So when the city and Terracon and the DNR claim that it's an abandoned night roost, somebody forgot to tell those hundreds of eagles that are night roosting there.”
The developers Jeff Hughbanks and Matt Stern created A Hana Illowa for the project. Last year, they hired Terracon to conduct a survey to identify bald eagles nesting on the proposed ten-acre site and within a 660-foot buffer. The one-day survey reported no nests in the area and observed only two eagles perched near the end of the buffer zone.
The Terracon survey also looked at communal roosting. The report read in part, “Additionally, the Milan Bottoms communal roost has not been utilized for the past two seasons. Instead, bald eagles have been reported to be utilizing habitat along the Mississippi River in Cordova, Illinois. Cordova is located ±22 miles north of the project site.”
Kelly said the findings are also contradicted by a six-year night-roosting study he conducted for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers between 2005 and 2011.
“During the course of that study, we showed that Milan Bottoms was certainly one of the largest, if not the largest, winter communal night roosts of bald eagles anywhere in the lower 48,” McKay said in an interview with WVIK. He said on several mornings and evenings during the six-year study, they saw between 600 and 800 bald eagles night-roosting in the Milan Bottoms.
He noted that at that time, the study separated the Milan Bottoms into high-use and low-use areas, with the high-use area upstream near the now-proposed development in Rock Island.
In the middle of the six-year study, Jumer's Casino & Hotel (now Bally’s) opened nearby at the intersection of Highway 92 and Interstate 280, causing a shift in bird activity. According to McKay, there was a statistically significant shift of eagles from that high use optimum area in the upstream end to the less optimal area in the downstream end following the opening of the casino. He stressed that the casino was farther away from the current development and even used downward-facing lights.
“In their report, they don't mention any methodology that they used, and they don't even cite our research, which again was one of the most intensive night roosting studies ever done. We produced eight technical reports for the US Army Corps of Engineers. Those reports are available from the Corps. They did not even look at any of those reports. And I know they didn't because I asked the Corps if anyone had requested those reports. No one has requested them, so I know they didn't even look at the results of that project.”
In response, McKay and three residents are spending the months of January and February conducting a survey focusing on the bald eagle population from Lock and Dam 14 in Le Claire to Lock and Dam 16 in Muscatine, spanning 38 miles. He is joined by Mark Roberts, a retired naturalist for Clinton County Conservation. Roberts said they view the eagles through binoculars to determine whether the birds are immature or adult.
“Young bald eagles are basically all brown or mottled. Their body is mottled with a lot of white patches and so forth,” Roberts said. “Adult eagles have the white head and white tail that you used to seeing in every place you see an eagle in advertising or whatever you see adult bald eagles, but they don't get the white head and tail until about five years of age.”
They divided coverage among 37 spots, already selected from the annual mid-winter bald eagle count.
“So by doing that weekly population survey, we're able to estimate approximately how many eagles are wintering in the area each week,” McKay said. “And then the second aspect of the study is we do a weekly night roost survey where we monitor and record the number of eagles coming out of Milan Bottoms that are night roosting in there. So that allows us to compare the number of birds night-roosting in Milan Bottoms to the number wintering in the area each week. And that allows us to estimate the proportion of the local wintering eagle population that is dependent on Milan Bottoms as a communal night roost.”
McKay said in the month of January, they’ve counted as many as 650 individual eagles. Jason and Cathleen Monson are assisting with the night roosting survey, which takes place at two stationary observation sites on the Iowa side of the Mississippi River. They have counted between 200 and 300 bald eagles using the floodplain forest for communal roosting during morning hours.
According to McKay, that means between 35% and 65% of the population is using the Milan Bottoms.
McKay said part of the fluctuating numbers is due to the extreme cold in January. He said there is a difference between a floodplain forest communal roosting area and a bluff communal roosting area.
“Eagles typically only use the bluff night roosts during the harshest, most severe winter weather conditions, like the last two weeks, this bitterly cold weather that we've had, I suspect a higher proportion of the eagles were night roosting in the bluff sites,” McKay said.
Communal roosts in floodplain forests are used more often in mild winters. McKay said there was only one other floodplain forest communal roost in the area, located on Arsenal Island upstream, which was lost nearly three years ago.
“The Army went in and cut the entire night roost down. Nobody knew it was coming. They didn't consult with anybody. They just went in and cut all the trees down. And so that night roost is gone. So that leaves Milan Bottoms as the only floodplain night roost in the Quad City area,” McKay said.
Roberts said he is privileged to assist McKay with the current survey.
“One of the things that you just have to put up with is [the] weather. And we're dancing around 20 below zero or whatever,” Roberts said. “Probably my best qualification is [that] I show up, and I can tell an adult bird eagle from an immature bird. But it's hard to be out there in these kinds of conditions. It takes dedication, and Kelly's got that in spades. And he inspires me to go the extra effort with him.”
They will continue their survey through the month of February.
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